Something for environmental/affect group?
From: enscan-request(a)uia.no <enscan-request(a)uia.no> On Behalf Of Stefka Georgieva Eriksen
Sent: den 28 januari 2026 13:11
To: enscan(a)uia.no
Subject: [enscan] CfP: Eco-emotions on Earth, 2.-4. September, Oslo
Dear colleagues,
The Eco-emotions research initiative is happy to share the Call for Papers for our next annual conference, Eco-emotions on Earth<https://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/research/projects/eco-emotions/annual-con…>, to take place on September, 2nd-4th, 2026, in Oslo.
Throughout the history of humanity, earth, with all its lifeforms, has had a crucial significance and impact on human existence, from providing essential resources, to symbolizing Mother Earth and home, or bringing forth earthquakes, draughts and landslides, and being a main motivation for violent conflicts and occupations. Whether hunter-gatherers' communities, the pioneers of the agricultural revolution, or inhabitants of urban and industrial centers, human cultures have always relied on stable relationships to earth and its resources and have strived to tame changes in these through different means, including trade, religion, or technology. With its rural and wild, cultivated and gardened forms, earth has enticed and inspired, as well as threatened and harmed, which has also led humanity to search for new lands, or to imagine alternative earths and lifeforms.
This conference invites scholars to explore how literature, on its own or in comparison to other humanities disciplines, has captured these shifting affective responses to earth and all its lifeforms in any literary genres, fiction and non-fiction, from any historical and geocultural areas, such as classical, medieval and modern literatures, Nordic and global. We welcome papers on topics including but not limited to:
* the role of earth and landscapes in representing and shaping emotional responses to climate change
* the aesthetical and ethical dimensions of earth
* earth as metaphor for affective responses to places and spaces
* agency of earth and all its lifeforms
* alternative/imaginary earths and lifeforms
Our keynote speakers this year are:
* Emily Lethbridge, Associate Professor at Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies
* David Farrier, Professor at School of Literature, Languages and Cultures, Personal Chair of Literature and Environment, The University of Edinburgh
* Serenella Iovino, James Gordon Hanes Distinguished Professor in Humanities, Department of Romance Studies, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
If you are interested in contributing to the conference with a 20-min paper, send a title, a brief abstract of 200 words, and a short bio to eco-emotions(a)iln.uio.no<mailto:eco-emotions@iln.uio.no> by March 15th, 2026. For more information, see the full Call for Papers here.<https://www.hf.uio.no/iln/forskning/prosjekter/affektiv-respons-pa-miljoend…>
Don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions, and feel free to share the CfP widely with other colleagues and students who may be interested.
With all best regards,
Stefka, on behalf of the organizing committee
Stefka G. Eriksen<https://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/people/aca/old-norse-and-celtic-philology…>
Associate Professor, Old Norse Studies/Medieval Studies
Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies
University of Oslo
PB 1102 Blindern
0317 Oslo
PI of research initiative Eco-Emotions<https://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/research/projects/eco-emotions/> (2024-2028)
Head of Research ILN - Institutt for lingvistiske og nordiske studier<https://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/research/projects/eco-emotions/events/mon…> (2025-2026)
Dear all,
I hope this e-mail finds you well and rested after the holidays. Soon the new semester begins, and we have much to look forward to, questions that need to be formulated and problems to be solved. This e-mail is just to give you all a little heads-up on what we have in the pipeline.
A new name and a new direction: IMS Green becomes IMS Environment
Things are moving in the world and in academia — and in our research interests. This year we will pursue a partially new line of inquiry that theoretically can be understood as an attempt to integrate the semiotic Växjö school of intermediality with the post-phenomenological and/or Heideggerian strand of media history. This attempt is motivated by an interest in how our environments are shaped by media and how our environments shape our forms of life. This interest does not exclude, we would argue, analyses of texts, films, and other media products that represent environmental issues. On the contrary, they are part and parcel of the processes that shape our environments.
When we meet for the IMS colloquium in Malmö in January, we would like to open the discussion once again on this new direction. Attached you find a revised version of the text that me and Jørgen shared with you when we met before christmas. It gives a general idea of what we want to do with this cluster and will serve as a presentation of the cluster on the LNU website.
[https://res.public.onecdn.static.microsoft/assets/fluentui-resources/1.1.0/app-min/assets/item-types/24/docx.png]IMS Environment förslag.docx<https://linnaeus-my.sharepoint.com/:w:/g/personal/ereraa_lnu_se/IQDW_oPzROI…>
The cluster meetings
This semester, our cluster will share the monthly Wednesday slots with the newly formed IMS Affect cluster. Our cluster has the last February 25 and April 29.
February 25: Critique and environmental media
The theme of the first meeting is critique and environmental media. By the latter we mean media that operate in relative independence of human consciousness but nevertheless have an impact on the world that we experience in a particular way: they produce and order the data of experience. In the meeting we will discuss Mark Hansen's "The Critique of Data, or Towards a Phenomenotechnics of Algorithmic Culture". In this text, Hansen argues that environmental media poses a challenge to established critical practices. They are calibrated for a situation in which norms, categories and habits structure our experience. Of course, this situation has not disappeared, but it has become more complex with the emergence of environmental media. Today it is not only our habits of thought that determine what is sayable and visible. When we start talking and experiencing, we are talking about and experiencing data that have already been mediated by algorithms. The question that Hansen poses is how to calibrate our critical practices for such a situation? What we want to do in this meeting is to discuss Hansen's response. Is it a direction that we can follow? Or do we need something else?
We are very grateful that our expert in media ecology Per Israelsson will lead the seminar and introduce the text.
The text is attached.
[https://res.public.onecdn.static.microsoft/assets/fluentui-resources/1.1.0/app-min/assets/item-types/24/pdf.png]hansen_critique_of_data.pdf<https://linnaeus-my.sharepoint.com/:b:/g/personal/ereraa_lnu_se/IQBJHlSXsu6…>
April 29: Yet to be decided
Workshop: The semiotic modalities reconsidered
The December workshop had to be postponed. As soon as we have a new date, we will share it with you.
Guest lecture: Claudio Paolucci (University of Bologna)
We will host a visit to Linnaeus University by Claudio Paolucci, professor in Philosophy and Theory of Languages at the University of Bologna. The date for his visit has not been set yet, most likely late April or early May.
Best wishes,
Erik and Jørgen
